by Ann-Marie Grissino and Lisa Pettyjohn, Carolina Chapter Senior Members

Do you ever need to collaborate on documents or spreadsheets in realtime? You can with Google Docs.

At the November 15, 2006, meeting of the Carolina Chapter Trends & Technologies (T&T) Local Special Interest Group (LSIG), members discussed Google web apps, such as Google Docs & Spreadsheets.

With Google Docs and Spreadsheets, you can upload a Microsoft Word document or Excel spreadsheet to Google, or you can create a new document. Then, you can invite those with whom you would like to collaborate to view the document by including their emails. Google sends an email invitation to collaborate on the file.

Several people can work on the file at the same time and see each other’s changes in real time! You can see the name of the person editing on the bottom of the view: it’s fantastic.

Accessing Google Docs & Spreadsheets

To access Google docs:

1. Open your browser and point to Google (http://www.google.com).
2. From the Google view, click More > Even More.
   
   

   The More Google Products page.

Editing Docs & Spreadsheets

To edit in Google:

1. Upload a Word document or Excel spreadsheet. Alternatively, create one in Google. Use the New Document, New Spreadsheet, and Upload links at the top of the page to take action.
2. To invite people to edit the document with you, click Collaborate and enter their emails.
   
   

   The Google Docs & Spreadsheets home page.%%%~hs~
3. To edit the document, click Edit.
   
   

   A new document in edit mode.

Using the Google Toolbar

The Google toolbar is a free tool from Google to enhance the use of your Microsoft Internet Explorer browser. (There is also a Mozilla Firefox version.) Obtain the Google toolbar at
http://toolbar.google.com/T4/index_xp.html?utm_source=en-et-more&utm_medium=et&utm_campaign=en.


You can customize the Google toolbar with a variety of buttons to search favorite sites, read news headlines, and more. You can also bookmark Web sites and access them from any other computer. (The other computer must have the Google toolbar installed.)

The search box gives you “smart” suggestions as you type in key words. Also, once you find a page using the Google toolbar search box, you can highlight the keywords by clicking the Highlight button. But my favorite feature is the pop-up blocker!

There are many, many more Google features. Learn all about them at http://www.google.com/support/toolbar/bin/static.py?page=features.html&hl=en&v=4.


Ann-Marie can be reached at amgrissino at keypointconsultants dot com. Lisa can be reached at Lisa dot Pettyjohn at bowebellhowell dot com.